How do you get sued every week and stay cheerful? ex Fox News host Tucker Carlson asked the former

P

resident

Donald

Trump

Wednesday

in an interview that was meant to steal the thunder

the first evening

Republican primary debate

on Wednesday

.

The pre-recorded 46-minute discussion

,

which was streamed on X (formerly Twitter)

,

looked more like a soft softball pitch between friends than the kind of high-wattage spectacle both men are accustomed to generating

especially on Fox News, the network that hosted the debate, which Carlson no longer uses and has become increasingly critical of Trump

. They talked about the president

joe

Biden’s skinny legs, what they felt really happened to Jeffrey Epstein

jail

(

S

suicide or murder?

early

Carlson

early

with furrowed eyebrows)

,

and Trumps repeated

already known

Reason to skip the debate

air runs

live

on Fox News

at the

terribly

the same time

the video has been released

.

But judging by Thursday morning headlines and social media trends, the once-powerful showmen have been overshadowed

edit

by a rally of low-voted Republican candidates in Milwaukee

stoic former V

ice

P

resident

Mike Pence v

request

It is the articulate entrepreneur

Vivek Ramaswamy

and more bad news related to Trumps

last run 2020 run

for the White House.

Mug shots of Trump’s co-defendant

S

Rudy Giuliani and

two

other political allies flooded the media sphere

follows after

the former mayor of New York

S

surrender

to the authorities in Georgia

associated with an expansion

RICO

case to overturn the 2020 presidential election. Trump is expected to surrender at the Fulton County Jail

in Atlanta today on Thursday in connection with net

one of four criminal cases filed against the former reality star

in the past months

.

Camaraderie

between Trump and Carlson,

forged around years of promotion

often

The Big Lie and a bond strengthened by both men’s loss of their former thrones permeated the interview. carlson,

to enthusiastic people who actively promoted

Trump

on his show, but

criticized him personally

supporter

which was fired by Fox News in April

follows after

a libel case.

Trump lost the last election by a wide margin, despite his allegations of fraud.

“I think getting rid of you was a terrible move,” Trump told Carlson

about from

his resignation from the crown jewel of Rupert Murdoch’s media empire.

In the meantime,

Carlson played on Trump’s claims that he was unfairly targeted and victimized

of a corrupt system

when

he asked the former president and asked this

on all indications

against him

: Are you afraid that they will try to kill you? Why wouldn’t they try to kill you, honestly? The two also leaned on a familiar interview pattern from their days at the top of the media world: Carlson gave Trump the unfettered runway to attack opponents rather than discuss policy. But even Trump’s vitriol towards the vicious maniac he never trusted, the former New Jersey

G

ov.

wrong

Chris Christie felt like an old trick in a drastically new era.

Meanwhile, Christie battled it out on Wednesday

on the stage

in a two-hour debate that also included Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley, South Carolina Senator Tim Scott, North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum and former Arkansas

G

ov.

wrong

Asa Hutchinson. Given Trump’s absence, that was the case

Finally

their chance to lose grip

That

Their party’s frontrunner influences the Republican electorate

and maybe they succeeded

.

Ramaswamy stole a page

T

rump’s 2016 playbook, which emerged as a stroppy

candidate

challenging Washington’s status quo. The 38th

–

year-old biotech entrepreneur provoked everyone

on the stage

,

say they referred to them

purchased and paid for

did that

the climate change agenda was a hoax and

declared

that he would stop supporting Ukraine if he became president.

Haley came hard at the zealous newcomer in what was arguably the sharpest conversation of the evening. Look what Putin did today, she said, referring to a questionable plane crash that killed Yevgeny Prigozhin, a critic of the Russian president. Hey killed

[Yevgeny]

Prigozhin. When I was at the UN, the Russian ambassador died suddenly. This man is a murderer. And you prefer a murderer to a pro-American country.”

Leader of the group

DeSantis

who is a distant second behind Trump in the polls,

Seemed stuck in 2020 as he ranted against COVID-era lockdown protocols, vowed to send Biden back to the basement and demonize

the

former Chief Medical Adviser to the President,

dr

Anthony Fauci.

Despite the willingness of the rest of the groups to passionately debate topical issues such as a federal abortion ban, they were all reluctant to talk about the man who wasn’t there. It was almost an hour after the broadcast when the moderator

Bret Baier

finally said

,

We take a moment and talk about the elephant that is not in the room.

Then he asked the candidates

,

If former President Trump is convicted in a court of law, would you still support him as the choice of the party? All responded in the affirmative except Christie and Hutchinson, both of whom were showered with a litany of boos from the vociferous crowd.

Then, after only

10

minutes spent on the right’s greatest opportunity and greatest obstacle in retaking the White House, co

–

presenter

Martha MacCallum

changed subject. You could almost hear the collective sigh of relief.

From Wednesday to Thursday

the 46 minute conversation

between Trump and Carlson on X

has already been viewed more than 150 million times, according to the social media platform

ratings on the debate were still not available. was watched by 50 million viewers, according to Fox News

But comparisons are difficult, since X

display

counts include everyone who

has

have been scrolling past the video ever since

What

Posted

on

Wednesday, if only for a few seconds, and Fox

s News

The numbers don’t include the many other ways people viewed the debate (YouTube

other

dvr,

for example etc

).

One thing is clear:

T

The duo’s conversation about “unfriendly” Fox News, the sale of the Panama Canal, or Trump’s deregulation of low-flow showerheads barely defined the national conversation

on

Thursday. Trump’s impending surrender and the fireworks and blunders of the other presidential hopefuls made up the story, rather than a conversation between two men trying to reclaim their former seats of power.